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Brainwashing you can believe in

September 08, 2009
Brainwashing you can believe in
By Neil Braithwaite

When Barack Obama told a Missouri crowd last November, "We are five days from fundamentally changing the Unites States of America," he meant exactly what he said and had a plan to do just that.

What is so striking about that statement is that in order to "fundamentally change" America, Obama will have to destroy the foundation laid by the founding fathers and replace it with one that serves his socialist ideology.

Candidate Obama subtly prepared the American people for that fundamental change by using the campaign slogan, "Change we can believe in." However, when you take a closer look at President Obama's policies, that slogan would be better interpreted as, "Change what you believe in." Take "change what you believe in" a step further to its logical and more accurate definition and you come up with the term brainwashed.

A close look at the top two definitions of brainwashed, clearly illustrates how well the term actually defines what the Obama administration is trying to do to Americans.

"Intensive, forcible indoctrination, usually political or religious, aimed at destroying a persons basic convictions and attitudes and replacing them with an alternative set of fixed beliefs."
"The application of a concentrated means of persuasion, such as an advertising campaign or repeated suggestion, in order to develop a specific belief or motivation."

In light of that definition, it's really not that much of a stretch to call it brainwashing, considering a majority of Americans still believe in hard work, capitalism, low taxes, less government spending, and less government intervention into every aspect of their daily lives. The majority also doesn't believe in "man-made" global warming or that the government can efficiently administer a healthcare system without having to ration care and raise taxes to pay for it. So given that the majority of Americans don't actually believe in the socialist policies President Obama is pushing, brainwashing is the most accurate definition.

If using the term brainwashed seems over to top, then feel free to substitute "thought reform" or "re-educate," which was the English term used before the 1950's. They both elicit a less ominous tone but mean the same thing as brainwashed.

History shows that dictators, despots and rulers have been using brainwashing techniques for thousands of years. They used brainwashing techniques to try and maintain power, control populations, and ultimately, change and transform the behaviors and beliefs of select groups of people and even entire societies.

In the 1950's, Psychologist, Robert Jay Lifton, performed a most interesting study of Brainwashing on former Korean War and Chinese war camp prisoners.

Lifton's brainwashing study took place in a "controlled and threatening environment" devoid of "normal social reference points" designed to "add to the targets difficulty in thinking critically and independently." Our current economic condition more than qualifies as a "threatening environment," when you take into account this is the worst financial recession since the great depression, we have a President that is heaping trillions of dollars in debt on a virtually bankrupt system, and an economy with millions of people out of work and thousands more losing their jobs every day with no end in sight.

In his study, Lifton defined three stages involved in brainwashing used by the captors, beginning with an "attack" on a prisoner's sense of self and ending with what appeared to be "a change in beliefs." Lifton defined the three stages as, "breaking down the self, the possibility of salvation," and "rebuilding the self." There are strong parallels between Lifton's stages and President Obama's incremental political strategies to, in his own words, "fundamentally change" America.

The "breaking down the self" stage is being fulfilled by President Obama, his administration, all his surrogates and the liberal media as they continue hammering the idea that people who oppose his policies are un-American, evil doers, racists, hate mongers, and anti-environment. This stage also involves trying to elicit guilt, shame and doubt from his opponents by intimating that their core beliefs are harmful to the country and the planet. Obama is even eliciting religion by saying that those who oppose his health care reform plans are "bearing false witness."

The "possibility of salvation" stage is being accomplished mostly through President Obama's many nationally televised news briefings and speeches where he personally reiterates that the country is in an economic recession because of old ideas and past policies. He offers to help resolve the crisis while assuring his opponents that they are not intrinsically bad -- just their ideas. He then offers the American people kind words of healing, togetherness, and salvation if they will embrace his solutions to the problem.

The final "rebuilding the self" stage will prove to be the toughest test for the Obama administration to complete the brainwashing process. In this stage, President Obama must get his opposition to reject their old belief system and accept his. He must clearly define the choice between going back to the "old' way of doing things and having the same bad results, or choosing to move ahead by embracing the "change" he is offering which will not only bring relief to the current economic crisis, but instill a sense of individual pride, renewal, responsibility and patriotism.

What President Obama is trying to do to America is a very serious thing. It was evidenced when Rahm Emanuel said, "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." He was clearly referring to the current economic environment and how it could prepare millions of people to be receptive to Obama's socialist policies. When asked to elaborate on his "serious crisis" statement, Obama's Chief of Staff said, "This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do the things you could not do before."

In order to succeed in doing "things you could not do before," and "fundamentally changing the Unites States of America," into a socialist state, President Obama knows there must be an environment conducive for his radical strategies to work. However, keeping America in a recession while incrementally brainwashing Americans to embrace his socialist ideology may prove much harder than even "the one" expected.

Americans are a proud and resilient people who, in difficult times, stick to their principles and always seem to bounce back and forge ahead -- stronger than before.

American pride is now showing itself through a huge groundswell of grassroot opposition to President Obama's socialist agenda through the Tea Party movement, mass participation in town hall meetings and other public protests around the country.

As long as Americans stay focused on the true foundations of this great country and not its radical socialist leader, they will never be brainwashed -- and America will continue to be the "Shining city on a hill" President Ronald Reagan spoke of in his farewell address to the nation.

Neil Braithwaite is a Real Estate Broker and writer in Charlotte, NC. He writes political commentary and satire and is a regular contributor to PoliticalDerby.com.